


Just Checking Up

by ifinkufreaky



Category: Vikings (TV)
Genre: F/M, Revenge Sex, keep your silence tribute fic, nightmare scenario, not canon, sad sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-17
Updated: 2017-12-17
Packaged: 2019-02-16 01:50:34
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13044021
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ifinkufreaky/pseuds/ifinkufreaky
Summary: Set in the Keep Your Silence universe, but this is a nightmare alternate timeline where Ivar and Lisbet broke up. I don’t know why @livebynight got so many anons asking about "what if they broke up," but I got just a little bit obsessed when she mentioned that Lis’ would, regrettably, hook up with Ubbe, and my brain was off to the races.THIS IS NOT CANON AND WILL NEVER HAPPEN TO OUR BABIES IN KEEP YOUR SILENCE, …but @livebynight did approve this story. The Nightmare Scenario. The Doomsday Timeline. The Fic That No One Wanted.





	Just Checking Up

**Author's Note:**

  * For [livebynight](https://archiveofourown.org/users/livebynight/gifts).



The first time Ubbe rang the bell at her new apartment, Lisbet almost had a panic attack. There were a few reasons she could think of that a Lothbrok might have shown up here now, after everything that had happened, and they ranged from unpleasant to deadly.

She sucked in one steadying breath and opened the door to that heartbreakingly familiar face. One of them had been bound to look her up sooner or later, and she was both pained and relieved that it was Ubbe. Outside of Ivar, he was the one she had formed the deepest connection with, and was the one that she missed the most. That was going to make this both easier and harder. “Checking up on me?” she asked, one eyebrow raised, trying her best to look calm and put-together. Totally not in need of checking. Nothing like a woman who had spent the entire morning watching trash tv with tears streaming down her cheeks.

Ubbe made a gesture that was half nod and half shrug and let himself into her home.

He had never been here before; Lisbet had rented the place after things ended with Ivar. But it was small enough that he found the kitchen without asking, set down the clinking paper bag in his arm onto the portion of the table not covered with unopened mail.

“You brought me something?”

Ubbe rubbed the back of his neck before meeting her eyes, unspoken apology for the awkwardness in the way his eyelids scrunched. “I thought I’d make you dinner,” he said, which was about the last thing she had expected to hear. “We need to talk.”

 

\-- Have the police contacted you? –- Has anyone asked you any questions about Ivar? –- What have you told your father about us? -–

They were the kind of questions she had expected, at least. Ubbe asked them so kindly that it wasn’t until he was gone that Lisbet realized how much steel had been underneath his voice, remembered the way he had peppered them into lighter conversations, the way his eyes flashed over the features of her face so carefully as she answered.

Of course they needed to know if she was a risk to their operation now. She was lucky Ubbe had bothered to question her at all, that they hadn’t just ordered a hit on her and moved on.

Though it was still hard to believe Ivar could do that.

There had been other questions too. – Have you been eating, Lis’? – When was the last time you left the apartment? – Can you sleep much? – She hadn’t broken down into tears in front of her ex-boyfriend’s brother, at least. But there were moments that had come close, and she was sure Ubbe had gotten a general idea of her state by looking around the chaos of her apartment, if not from her glassy-eyed face.

He had wrapped his arms around her before he left, suffocating her in the too-familiar scent of the detergent that washed the clothes of everyone that lived in the Lothbrok house. “It’s good to see you,” he had mumbled into the top of her head.

*****

Ubbe just started showing up after that. He always brought food, always asked a few of the same questions, and Lisbet could never decide if he was there primarily to check up on her or to  _ check up on her. _ But as the weeks went by she stopped feeling so nervous when his tall frame filled her doorway, actually started to feel some comfort in his silent bulk next to her on the couch.

He brought over the most random Blu-rays.  _ Guardians of the Galaxy. The Princess Bride.  _ Season four of  _ The Office. _ Never explaining his choices. Lisbet was just happy to have a distraction, to take away some of the subtle awkwardness of his company. Occasionally something would even make her laugh, though laughing with Ubbe sometimes left her feeling worse. Too nostalgic.

*****

She couldn’t stop crying. She wasn’t even thinking particularly of Ivar today. She was just...in hell. Every neuron in her brain was fried. She would never be capable of happiness again. When the bell buzzed she let Ubbe up and cracked the door open, then just stood in front of it waiting and shaking. She wasn’t even embarrassed for him to see her like this. They were beyond that now.

When Ubbe pushed through the doorway his brows furrowed instantly in concern. Lisbet distantly wondered what she looked like to him. She had managed to shower today, fixed her hair, had actually thought she was looking cute before the crying started. Maybe that was why the crying started.

He wrapped her up in his arms, making soothing noises like one would use on a child. She felt like a child. Almost three months since it had ended with Ivar and she was still barely hanging on. Ubbe shuffled her back as she sobbed into his shoulder, pushing her into her bedroom. Maybe because it was closer than the couch. He made her sit down on the edge of the bed, rocked her vaguely until she started to calm.

Lisbet felt dead. Ubbe felt very much alive. His heart thumped against her cheek, going too fast to be calming, but she found it reassuring all the same. Her hands wound around his waist, her breath sucking in suddenly as a burst of endorphins surprised her. She almost teared up again just at how  _ good _ his arms felt around her. Even when she and Ivar had been together, he had always been so soothing to her. Cleaning up after his brother’s mistakes, softening his rough edges with knowing smiles or playful, emoji-laden texts. And here he was still, just trying to help her feel better. To assist her with the agony that had been loving Ivar Lothbrok.

Ubbe shifted, in a way that made his body rub softly across hers. A guilty heat flashed between Lisbet’s legs but she ignored it. Just an accident of their proximity. He wrapped one big hand around the back of her head and kissed her gently on her crown.

His lips lingered longer than they should have, pressed just a little bit too urgently. They both pulled back awkwardly, checking each other’s faces but glancing away instantly, afraid to see.

“You’re still in your robe,” Ubbe observed, voice a little rough.

Lisbet looked down. Apparently she had not quite managed to get dressed today. And here she had thought she was doing so well, actually having showered.

She took too long to move. Ubbe cleared his throat and stood up, crossed the room in two paces to her closet. “I’ll find you something to wear.”

As she watched him rifle through her clothes, something broke in Lisbet. She was so tired of feeling  _ stagnant. _ Something had to change in the monotony of her grief. She looked at the way Ubbe’s shirt clung to the muscles of his back and felt another echo of the heat that had been induced by his arms. It felt good, it felt like  _ something. _ Even the thought of betraying Ivar by seducing his older brother felt good, brought out the anger that had taken too long to find.

When Ubbe turned around Lisbet had dropped the robe from off her shoulders, baring her breasts to him and sticking her chin up in something like a challenge. He stared at her for one long moment, wild eyes fixed not on her body but her face, searching it for clues even more intently than he had done in his first interrogation of her.

He let the clothes he had selected drop to the floor. He was on her in an instant, both hands cupping her cheeks, steadying her so that he could cover her mouth with a hungry kiss, one that deepened when she did not resist.

Lisbet groaned against Ubbe’s tongue. The adrenaline and endorphins of the moment almost fried her pleasure-starved brain. She ran her hands over his tight shirt, pulling him down, coaxing him to lay across the bed with her.

She told herself it was just because she wanted to feel something. She told herself it was just a way to get back at Ivar. But Ubbe was not a stranger. This was anything but impersonal. The soft, needy moans he was making as his mouth devoured every inch of her exposed skin came from a familiar voice. The body pinning her to the bed was one she had casually touched a million times before, polite hugs and the accidental brushes of shared living space. Every cell in her body was on fire at the wild transgression of this.

Ubbe ate his way back up to her neck, one hand closing over her tit and the other pushing along her hip under the belt of her robe, which was still tied around her waist. “Do you know how long I’ve—”

“Don’t,” Lisbet cut him off harshly. They weren’t going to do that.  _ Talk _ about any of this. She buried her fingers in the long hair at the top of his head and shoved her tongue into his mouth. Why did they both have this fuckboy haircut. Why was it so fucking hot.

Ubbe took her eagerness as his cue to continue, pressing his hand between her legs. His fingers hurt a little, digging too deep, too fast. She wanted it that way, welcomed the pain with the pleasure. He wasn’t supposed to be in there. The mixed sensations were appropriate.

He groaned in her ear, something nasty about the heat of her, and her memory flashed to some dim, almost-forgotten moment when they had both been drunk and had indulged in a long lusty look in the back room of a house party, maybe a year ago. Suddenly the only thought left in Lisbet’s mind was getting Ubbe Lothbrok’s dirty, always-sleeping-around dick out of his pants and into her hands. He didn’t stop fingering her for a second as they fumbled all of his clothes off, and then she had her prize.

Ubbe was thick and curved. There was a path of blonde hair from his balls all the way up to his chest, and maybe she could finally stop thinking about Ivar now because so much about his body was so different. His beard tickled her ear as he nuzzled at her, muttering obscenities mixed with her name as she worked her hand over and around his throbbing cock.

“Look at me,” he asked, fingers still pumping inside of her, thumb rubbing little circles into her clit now. Lisbet could only meet his eyes for two seconds before she was tossing her head, entirely unable to handle the depth in those icy eyes. She pushed his head down her body, showing him the only way he was allowed to worship her.

Ubbe’s tongue worked with the patience and eagerness of a champ, but he could not quite push her over the edge. Lisbet was not very surprised by that, wondered distantly if after Ivar she would ever come for anyone again. But everything else about Ubbe in her bed felt good enough. “Fuck me,” she urged when she finally conceded to herself that she was not going to get there tonight.

She missed Ivar’s cool command in the bedroom too, but the beastly nature of Ubbe’s lust almost made up for it. He came up from between her legs with eyes so lost and wild it looked like he had grown entirely incapable of rational thought. He nipped and bit at her flesh as he advanced over her body, grinning so purely that he actually got her to smile back for a moment.

He hovered over her, cock in hand. “Condom?” Ubbe asked, eyes creeping toward the nightstand. So some rational thought yet remained.

Lisbet shook her head. “I don’t have any.”

Ubbe groaned and rocked his body off the bed. “There might be one in my wallet.”

Lisbet watched him crouch and rifle through his discarded pants. She told herself this was her chance. She could stop this before they really went all the way. She might regret it less if she didn’t let it go further. But her body was craving him now; she needed to be filled, and pinned, and fucked. And it needed to be Ubbe doing it.

With a little cry of victory Ubbe pulled a foil packet out of his wallet, tore it open with his teeth and spread the rubber over himself in one practiced motion before returning to the bed. He hovered over her just as before, nipping at her cheek. “Look at me,” he repeated.

She tried. Ubbe’s eyes were needy, and compassionate, and something that looked like love and scared the shit out of her lurked around the edges. “Fuck me,” she answered, screwing her eyes shut and lifting her hips toward him.

Ubbe growled in frustration and his hands tore at her shoulders, dragging her up to flip her onto her stomach. “I can do that,” he rumbled, voice low and threatening, almost unrecognizable. He propped her up on her knees, pushed her face into the pillow, and swirled the thick head of his cock against her opening.

Lisbet moaned and thrust herself up against him. Ubbe took that as his cue to sink into her, working his girth between her lips with only the barest concern for her comfort. “Is this how you need it?” He bounced his hips against her a few times once he was fully inside. “Fast and rough?”

“And hard,” Lisbet agreed, drooling into the pillow a little as Ubbe’s hand considered to press her face down.

“Fuck. Yes,” Ubbe enunciated, letting her have it then. Perhaps he had wanted to take her gently at first, but clearly his tastes could run rougher too. His pounding was intense, the sensation almost doubled by the fact that it had been so long and his rhythm was unfamiliar. Her body shifted and shimmered, cried and screamed at the overwhelming rush of it, and just when she thought she might not be able to take it anymore Ubbe stuttered and moaned. “Fuck, Lisbet,” he swore under his breath, “fuuuuuuck.”

He froze inside of her, breath ghosting over the back of her neck for a moment, then he grasped the bottom of the condom and pulled himself out of her carefully.

Ubbe collapsed onto his back and tried to pull her in against his side. Instead, Lisbet lifted her body up to fumble at the sheets, trying to get under them. He caressed her back with one hand as he helped her accomplish the task. He tried to cuddle her again after they were both tucked in. She wanted it and she didn’t, her thoughts swirling. Suddenly this was all too much, the sex haze dissipating and the weight of her usual pain crushing back in all over her consciousness. The thought of laying pressed up against Ubbe’s naked body now was making her sick.

“I need you to leave,” Lisbet said, turning away from him.

Ubbe was silent only a moment. “Of course,” he said softly. The mattress squeaked as he got off of it, then all she heard was the shuffling sounds of him putting his clothes back on. She heard him stop before he got to the door, soft footsteps padding as he came back to her side of the bed.

His hand cupped her cheek softly, then he was pressing another kiss into the curls on the top of her head. “I’ll see you,” he mumbled, like this was a normal goodbye, after any one of their visits, and then he walked out just as she had asked.

 

She knew he would be back.


End file.
